culturalboundaries

Stick + Stones project

Audra Buck-Coleman, is our first keynote speaker of the day, Coleman’s topic Identifying Potential Pitfalls + Windfalls in Collaborative Projects will definitely set the tone for what follows. She will address some major issues surrounding collaboration, and it consistent use as a  buzz word in higher education. Finally she proposes design educators develop more projects that foster critical thinking skills to make students better prepared for today’s creative working environments. Audra explores some of the pitfalls that exist with her projects, and investigates the advantages and disadvantages of working collectively across boarders with other cultures where English is not there first language.

How can design educators adept some of Audra’s rich skills and knowledge for collaborative projects?

What happens when language is a barrier to enhance collaborative critical learning outcomes?

Audra’s presents one project between Blacks students in  southern community and Mormons who came to realized they shared  more similarities then differences.

She proposes the following question to consider: When working on collaborative projects do your students know how to navigate through stereotyping issues with other ethnic, religious, gender based groups?

Audra proposes the following suggestions based on her collaborative experience of working with Students in China:

Chinese students prefer organized structured learning over US students flexible learning.

What is your Classroom Culture?

Are you well versed in the nuances of the culture?

How prepared are you for flexibility and improvisation in the classroom?

What are the benefits of the professors experience from collaboration?

Check out: Stick + Stones

Sorry I took a little time-out, however I’m back with this week’s buzz. Eric Benson from the University of Illinois, in Urbana and I will be the quest blogger for GLIDE10, a virtual symposium taking place on 27 October, 2010, starting early at 8:30AM. Eric maintains renourish blog that focuses on sustainable design. We’ll be posting questions on our blogs, and twitting simultaneously during each presenters talk from all over the globe. This years theme focuses on indigenous design with line-up featuring a host of design intellectuals from around the world, such as Audra Buck-Coleman from China, Adream Blair-Early from USA, Dr. Li-Hsun Peng and Chia-Hsin, from Taiwan are among some of the distinguished presenters this year. Great you don’t need to travel anywhere far. It’s easy to register then throw back while you relax  at home in front of your computer, TV in your jammies, or office or classroom space and just listen.

Keep in mind none of my commentary postings directly reflect the opinions of the conference planning committee Audrey Bennett, Adream Blair-Early and Gloria Gomez. As a designer and educator I was asked to share my opinions and that’s exactly what I have done.

This is major step in the right direction in the sphere of Graphic and Type Design, for MacArthur Foundation to award Matthew Carter, a major Type Designer as one of the 2010 MACARTHUR Fellows. Carter is a masterful wizard in working with letterforms having had created over 6o typefaces,  he’s also the Co-founder and Principal of Carter and Cone Type . If you’re a type connoisseur you’re sure to want to send him words of praise. Read more about Matthew Carter on the Mac Arthur Foundation website.

Renee Kemp-Rotan co-founder of the blog,  BlackDesignNews.com and the director of Capital Projects for the City of Birmingham, Alabama has authored a project to revitalize the devastated country of Haiti. She’s seeking all those creative visionaries interested in helping to rebuild Haiti to answer the international call for papers.

The following as reported on BDN:

TOWARDS A POST-EARTHQUAKE DEVELOPMENT MANUAL

by Renee Kemp-Rotan, author of the code
A Culture Code for Haiti: The Rebuilding of National Identity through Architecture (NIA) assumes that culturally informed architecture can help to fulfill new national ideals, through rebuilding Haiti as a utopian civilization with NIA/purpose.
First, The Culture Code will outline a comprehensive framework of 100 cultural considerations advanced across the socio-economic geography of pre-colonial, colonial, post-colonial and post-earthquake Haiti, in a way that informs all future design and development.
Second, The Culture Code is an international call for papers to address 100 topics on Haitian culture, politics and space for:
•    cultural anthropologists
•    geographers
•    policy planners
•    urban designers
•    architects
•    developers
•    economists
•    historians
•    disaster experts
Third, The Culture Code will meld ‘form and content’ data collected above to propose a series of design principles structured to influence all future and permanent master plan efforts in the rebuilding of post-earthquake Haiti. Thus both quantitative and qualitative design decisions can be made.
Fourth, The Culture Code will develop specific ‘pilot prototypes’ that lead to a system of development contracts that follow best practices for town planning/settlement building/housing designs (macro and micro) that  are culturally significant, replicable, yet influenced by population capacity, location, geography, transportation, communication and resources.

For more information: visit http://www.haiticulturecode.com

Check out AIGA’s Design Journey: You Are Here

This is a photo essay of the opening night celebration.

Above is a selection of photos which include mural design by Rafael Esquer of Alfalfa Studio, Exhibition Design by Marcos Chavez of TODO, group shot of 2010 graduates of D-Crit program Angela Reichers, Alan Rapp and Fred Duarto.

After recently reading this post on a design colleagues Ayana Baltrip blog, DESIGNSPEAKS, I decided this essay was definitely worthy to share, with my design friends too. Steve Mehallo, teaches at American River College and he decided to share his views on the best ways to teach and research Graphic Design History. I’m interested in hearing your thoughts about Mehallo’s essay, on how design history should be taught.

Read about Mehallo’s refreshing methods on, how he teaches Design History. His essay offers you a thorough review on many of the key design history books considered the best by lots of design educators. I’m not going to mention any of the design history books, since you’ll get to read all about them in Mehallo’s essay. Although Mehallo’s does give you his aesthetic reasons on which books are worthy, and which ones need to skipped. In addition, his essay offers a solid rationale why anyone who teaches design history should not solely depend upon one book, but develop their own research methodology to make this subject engaging. Otherwise once you start lecturing and showing slides, you might just get a lot of students sitting in your class with their heads bowed once you turn down the lights. Last fall, I started my second Master’s in the Design Criticism program at School of Visual Arts in NYC. As a design educator, who also loves teaching Design History, I must confess that teaching this topic is an arduous task. However, my design history instructor in the program, Russell Flinchum, taught our class with the rigor of a southern baptist minister on Sunday morning. All to say, none of my classmates dared to bow their heads once the lights were turned down. As for me I left Russell’s class with a more varied knowledge on the history of design, and a lot of new books to add to my already overloaded bookcases at home. (above photograph; by Steve Melhallo student Samantha Costanilla).

Read more about Mehallo on his blog: http://mehallo.com/blog/

So I’ve been teaching my version of ‘a history of graphic design’ for several years now. Just finished up my 9th session.

As a text, Philip B. Meggs’ landmark research book – History of Graphic Design, first released in 1984 – is the bible on the subject. Even the ‘making of’ has its own edition.

It’s the most thorough analysis, and one of the best graphic design reference books I own. But as Meggs points out in his introduction, it’s only the tip of the iceberg. There is so much more to discover, find, research and incorporate into one’s own view.

Finally, there is another book that just hit the market – The Story of Graphic Design by Patrick Cramsie. It tackles similar ground, but from another angle. A refreshing find. And from what I could tell so far, it syncs with my own classroom take on ‘The Story’ . . .

I’m honored to be a part of such a creative group of 25 designers in the show Design Journey: You Are Here, set to open on 20 May, this week at AIGA in NYC. My good friend Rafael Esquer of alfalfa studio is busy racing against time to put the finishing touches on the mural for the exhibition.
Check out some of Raf’s sketches, better yet make sure to see the show to experience his amazing mural artistry.

I called Raf to offer my help along with some of his artist and designer to paint the mural on the wall in the AIGA gallery. And the entire process will be videotaped.

Below of are few more examples of the murals.

You Are Here opening reception: Wednesday, May 19, from 6:00–8:00 p.m. at the AIGA National Design Center. The exhibition was designed by TODA and will be open to the public from May 20 to June 23.

Just out.  While media moves through space quicker than superman, this new updated version of Social Media Revolution 2 differs drastically from last years outdated video, this version is fresher with new stats and graphics.
Social Media Revolution 2 is a refresh of the original video with new and updated social media & mobile statistics that are hard to ignore. Based on the book Socialnomics by Erik Qualman.
As reported by the SocialTimes Blog:
Socialnomics Revisits ‘Social Media Revolution’
Last August Erik Qualman, author of Socialnomics, introduced ‘Social Media Revolution’, an infographic video chock full of social media statistics.  The original video was a hit, with over 1.8 million views, but in the 9 months since it was released the world of social media has changed quite a bit and many of the statistics represented in the video have become outdated.  Yesterday, Socialnomics released a refresh of their video, new and improved with up-to-date social media and mobile statistics, facts and figures.
For more read the SocialTImes.

I could not resist posting this amazing Graphic Design biennial featuring some of the most prolific international designers. Check out the poster design it’s an excellent example of the use of symbolism merging two cultures (Chinese and German).

The First Graphic Design Biennial Germany–China will open in Offenbach, Germany om May 12, 2010. More than 300 contemporary posters and 150 books, as well as numerous animations will be shown in the Am alten Schlachthof exhibition hall.
The best communication designers of China are coming to Germany to attend the opening. Amongst them will be Min Wang, designer of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games graphic identity, and many world famous poster and book designers. Furthermore they will give lectures and presentations at the HfG Offenbach from May 10 to 12. The presenters include Bi Xuefeng (Shenzhen), Chen Shaohua (Shenzhen), Chen Zhengda (Hangzhou), Yang Liu (Berlin), Lü Jingren (Beijing), Sascha Lobe (Stuttgart), Eike König (Berlin), Song Xiewei (Beijing) and Wang Min (Beijing).
Additional information can be found on the official website www.biennale-decn.com

Below examples of Poster in Chinese and German

Bruce Mau – A World Without Oil from Bruce Mau Design on Vimeo.

Bruce Mau speaking about participating in the visioning process to re-imagine the future of Liverpool on 11 May:

Bruce Mau Design Visionary to Speak as Part of Everton Park Project Consultation

Visionary and world-leading innovator Bruce Mau is participating in the visioning process to re-imagine the future of Liverpool.  Mau’s visit will focus specifically on Everton Park as a potential catalyst for change during 2010 Year of Health and Wellbeing.   In a lecture at Liverpool Hope University, Mau will share some major recent initiatives at Bruce Mau Design studio that can be seen as case studies for this ambitious endeavor.

The event will take place in the Hope Theatre, The Capstone Building, Liverpool Hope University Creative Campus, L3 8QB on 11 May, 6pm.